The Food Inc. Challenge: Make Soup Cool Again

Food companies are betting more portable packaging and trendier flavors will do something for soup that mom can’t: make it cool to twenty-somethings.

The efforts by Campbell Soup Co. and General Mills Inc. include selling soup in microwavable pouches, touting ingredients like quinoa and shiitake mushrooms, and offering low-calorie varieties for weight-conscious members of a generation known as “millennials.”

The efforts are aimed at heating up sales after years of decline. Unit sales of soup fell by almost 3.5% in 2012, according to SymphonyIRI Group. The market research firm doesn’t break down sales by age, but soup makers say Baby Boomers are the biggest soup eaters.

So soup makers see an opportunity to increase sales by targeting millennials, people born between 1982 and 2004. The challenge is that preferences vary widely across this group. Teens are accustomed to instant gratification and are more likely to want a microwavable soup, while 20-somethings have been influenced by the trend toward fresh foods and are more interested in cooking from scratch, according to Tina Wells, chief executive of Buzz Marketing Group, a firm that specializes in marketing to young people.

They’re also tricky to market to because the economic downturn left many of them unemployed and still living with their parents into their 20s. As unemployment hit teens and young adults harder than any other group during the economic downturn, Burger King, which had long targeted young customers, saw its sales plummet a couple of years ago. It has since experienced a rebound after broadening its menu and marketing to older consumers. Gum companies such as Wm. Wrigley Jr. Co. and Mondelez International Inc. have had a hard time getting young people back into chewing gum, in part because of its price. Banks and credit-card companies also have struggled with reaching out to young customers, says Ms. Wells.

But soup has some good things going for it. Campbell Soup in August introduced a new line of soup aimed at what it called “time-crunched 20-somethings” called Campbell’s Go. The soups come in such varieties as coconut curry with shiitake mushrooms and quinoa with poblano chilies and are packaged in microwavable pouches with grips on either side that stay cool to avoid burns, so the soup can be squeezed into a bowl after heating.

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